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For years manufacturers have been duking it out at Germany’s famed Nürburgring circuit to see who has the engineering might and the driving talent to set the production lap record around the green hell. The last time Chevrolet had a go at it in a 2009 Corvette ZR1, the top-spec ‘Vette returned a stellar lap of 7:26.4, which at the time was billed as the fastest lap around the 12.9 mile, 154 turn circuit in a production car.

The ZR1’s lap time stood for all of a month before a Ferrari Enzo beat its time by a second. But Chevrolet and the Corvette team weren’t done and they had another crack at it in the revised 2012 Chevrolet Corvette ZR1, with the same driver, Jim Mero at the wheel. This time around, the Corvette team got even more impressive results, the ZR1 managed to shave an impressive seven seconds off of its previous lap time, completing the lap in 7:19.4.

Jim Mero’s new lap time of 7:19.4 in the 2012 Corvette ZR1 stands as either the fastest or second fastest lap of the ‘Ring for a production car, depending on who you talk to. Porsche currently claims to have the record for production car around the Nürburgring, with a time of 7:18 completed in 2010 in a 911 GT2 RS. But unlike Chevrolet, Porsche hasn’t released a video of the record lap time, nor has it admitted to whether or not the car was completely stock or not.

According to Corvette Chief Engineer Tadge Juechter, the 2012 ZR1 used in the video is “completely stock as it would be received by a real customer.” Juechter goes on to say, “We do have to add some safety equipment which actually adds weight to the vehicle and actually slows us down a little bit, but the rest of the car is to production specifications including alignment, trim height and everything you would normally expect out of a factory vehicle, up to and including the suspension parameters [and] the Michelin Pilot Sport Cup tires.”

If the Corvette was completely stock (other than safety equipment), with the same driver, then how did Chevrolet shave an impressive seven seconds off of the ZR1’s last lap time in 2008? Well again, according to Juechter, “We feel we have a pretty substantial performance upgrade.” Possibly the biggest improvement on the 2012 ‘Vette ZR1 is the addition of those Michelin Pilot Sport Cup tires. The DOT legal tires are quite possibly some of the stickiest rubber you can get for a production car and they’re new to the ZR1 this year. In addition to the new tires, Juechter says that the Corvette team has made other improvements to the ZR1, “We also have other chassis improvements [and] aero improvements, so we hope to show that we really improved the capability of the car.” With a seven-second lap improvement, consider us shown. Check out the remarkable video for yourself below.